A retired Air Force captain is breaking her silence about the 2011 downing of a Chinook helicopter gunship that killed 38 fighters in Afghanistan. It is regarded as the deadliest attack against Navy SEALS in U.S. history. As much as we think we know about the actual truth, the government has proven time and time again that they are always covering the real truth.

According to the retired captain, the disaster could have been prevented had it not been for restrictions to the military’s rules of engagement that were changed under the Obama administration.

Retired Air Force Capt. Joni Marquez

The mission which took place onAugust 6, 2011, Retired Air Force Capt. Joni Marquez and her crew were flying early morning operations that she described “as almost like a 9-1-1 type of a situation.”

According to Circa, The gunship was ordered to fly close-in air support above Afghanistan’s dangerous Tangi Valley, in Wardak Province, assisting troops with the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment who were being fired on by eight heavily armed Taliban insurgents.

The Rangers had called in for assault helicopters to engage the enemy hiding among the rocky valley. The air weapons team fired on the Taliban fighters, but not all of the insurgents were killed as originally believed.

Marquez stated, “I had the sensor operators immediately shift to the eight insurgents the helicopters had taken out,” Marquez told Circa, in her first interview about the incident. “Two were still alive.”

Unfortunately, Marquez was denied the request to take out the remaining two insurgents which she believed ultimately sealed the fate of the Chinook helicopter.

According to official reports, the helicopter was taken out by an insurgent with a rocket launcher. The attack killed 38 that night, and 17 were SEALS.

Her account is corroborated by a previously top-secret report by the Defense Department inspector general that includes interviews with some of Marquez’s colleagues on the gunship, including the commander.

“If we would’ve been allowed to engage that night, we would’ve taken out those two men immediately. I mean, it’s just one of those things where you know that it could’ve all been prevented,” she said, tearing up at times as she recollected that night.

If not for Obama’s changes in approach to the “rules of engagement” of war, many of those soldiers may still be alive. It was just another one of Obama’s great failures as POTUS.